Pursuit: A spectacular storm-chasing time-lapse made from 90,000 photos

Storm chaser and award-winning photographer Mike Oblinski has done it again: he's created a time-lapse that will blow you away. Captured over the course of three months, across 10 states, and involving 28,000 miles of driving and over 90,000 time-lapse frames, Pursuit is the result of utter determination.

Oblinski tells the story behind this time-lapse in the video's description, explaining how this season of storm chasing nearly broke him.

After 12 straight days on the road and away from his family, he left once again, just 24 hours after getting home, to chase another storm on June 12th. But doubt got the better of him, and he found himself 80 miles away from the spot he needed to get to.

"I got back in the car and as I drove, the pain got the better of me and the tears came," he writes. "It may not be easy to understand why, but when you work as hard as I did this spring, a moment like that can break you. I felt like I let my wife down. But mostly I let myself down. I forgot who I was and that's not me. Or it shouldn't have been me. I failed myself. And it seemed like the easy choice to just give up and head for home."

But he didn't head for home, he decided to keep going, got out ahead of the storm, and captured one of the best structures he'd seen all spring.

The result of that decision not to give up, to keep on going even when it seemed like he had utterly failed, is one of Oblinski's best time-lapse films yet... and that's saying something if you know his previous work.

Great work! Beautiful captures! I have to say being a British ex-pat now living in Texas, storm season holds a fascination for me. The speed at which some super cells form is astonishing. To see the clouds dancing as they form is memorizing. If you live in Tornado Alley, you are left in no doubt as to the power of nature and how fast it changes...seeing. a big black looming cloud and feeling a 40mph+ downdraft reinforces that fact.

Truly captivating and awe inspiring video. What is most thought provoking is to see such a display of power, and then to reflect on the fact that it is taking place on the surface of a speck of dust in the vast universe.

That's no theory, that's fact. The Videos were taken as Timelapse, not as a video (clouds don't move that fast, you know). So you use the full 22MP Sensor for the images and make a Movie out of it afterwards. But I guess you only wanted to let the world know that your MFT can shoot 4k (which cannot be compared to Fullframe). Thank you.

You commented back quite rudely initially. "nice theory," tell me that doesn't come across just a tad condescending. If you read the article, you would see it quite clearly states "90,000 time-lapse frames"

Stunning photography, true dedication to the project. On a side note as a former Midwesterner its disturbing the proliferation of bird choppers changing the landscape and scary the number of storm chasers parading in shots....

Not difficult to switch it off yourself really so little point in the comment and hopefully you can allow others to enjoy it with different tastes.It is amazing with all the work that goes in to such a great video and atmospheric music that these dreary sort of comments always have to creep out of the internet woodwork.

This is what always gets me lol. You just turn off the music, easy. To call it crappy is so belittling to the artist who composed it. This was a custom track, we worked together on an original song for it and it was all done to help show the clips how I felt they should be.

I honestly don't get people who wouldn't want some music along with it :)

The music was great and fit the video perfectly. Especially the parts where the music goes into vocal choir only mode, combined with the quick flashing of many lightning strikes is particularly effective imho.

A near impossible feat. Avatar like scenes made with nature alone and without special effects/graphics. "I forgot who I was and that's not me. Or it shouldn't have been me. I failed myself. And it seemed like the easy choice to just give up and head for home."But he didn't head for home, he decided to keep going, got out ahead of the storm, and captured one of the best structures he'd seen all spring.

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